The city of Toronto in Canada topped the list of 25 global cities indexed by YouthfulCities, an organisation that assists youth in building better cities.

Toronto beat Berlin and New York City, which placed second and third on the list based on 16 categories such as civic participation, diversity, safety and mental health, food and nightlife.

The index was based on a survey of 2,000 young people conducted by YouthfulCities in March and April which used dozens of indicators for the 16 categories, broken down into the three broad sections of live, work and play.

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Robert Barnard, co-founder of YouthfulCities, said Toronto came out on top because of its assets when it comes to youth such as diversity, music and film. However, the Canadian city was rather weak when it comes to safety and mental health, civic participation and internal transportation.

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He added that Toronto topped the list partly because of Bixi, its bike rental programme that the city council had planned to cancel. However, two weeks ago, the city council - which has been battling cocaine-sniffing Mayor Rob Ford - agreed to continue the bicycle rental programme which is city wide.

Other cities included in the index are London, Rome, Tokyo, Bogota in Colombia, Lagos in Nigeria and Kinshasa in Congo.

Mr Barnard said the index's main goal is to include the youth in conversations insofar as the directions of their cities are concerned.

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